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President Donald Trump yesterday warned that Iran’s energy plants and oil wells would be obliterated if it did not open the Strait of Hormuz immediately, after Tehran described US peace proposals as “unrealistic” and fired waves of missiles at Israel.

Trump, a day after sounding conciliatory and suggesting a deal could be reached this week, issued an ominous warning yesterday.

“Great progress has been made but, if for any reason a deal is not shortly reached, which it probably will be, and if the Hormuz Strait is not immediately ‘Open for Business,’ we will conclude our lovely ‘stay’ in Iran by blowing up and completely obliterating all of their Electric Generating Plants, Oil Wells and Kharg Island (and possibly all desalinization plants!), which we have purposefully not yet ‘touched,’” Trump said.

Iran has previously threatened that if its key economic sites face further US and Israeli strikes, it will target the energy infrastructure of its oil and gas-rich Arab neighbours on the Gulf.

Market experts warned that any US ground operation or wider Iranian retaliation could send oil prices to levels not seen since the July 2008 commodity boom, when the cost of world benchmark crude Brent hit close to $150 per barrel -- and could rise far more.

Brent has already risen in price by nearly 60 percent this month, and the US benchmark WTI by more than half.

“If the US were to launch a ground invasion of Iran, … projections of $200 (a barrel) oil will not be an otherworldly supposition anymore,” analyst Tamas Varga of PVM Energy said.

On Sunday night, the US president told

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